


the better half

by poalimal



Category: Little Women (2019), Little Women Series - Louisa May Alcott
Genre: F/M, Gen, Latin and the learning thereof
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-25
Updated: 2020-01-25
Packaged: 2021-02-27 11:48:28
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,181
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22406713
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/poalimal/pseuds/poalimal
Summary: Ultimately from such Latin poetic phrases asanimae dīmidium meae(“half of my soul”) (Horace writing about Virgil), when it instead referred to a close friend (comparesoulmate).
Relationships: Theodore Laurence/Josephine March
Comments: 10
Kudos: 86





	the better half

_1868_   
_New York City, NY_

'I don't _want_ to learn Latin anymore!' said Minnie. She'd been in a foul mood since morning, so Jo had seen this explosion coming. She was not, however, gratified to see it arrive. 'Why can't they just write in English?'

Minnie knew the answer to this as surely as she knew Jo's full first name - she'd asked about it often enough. 'Why, that's quite all right, my dear,' said Jo. 'You don't have to do anything at all if you don't want to, you can just sit over there in the corner with Milly-doll while I finish up here with Kitty.'

If Jo did not know Kitty so well, she might not have noticed her perk up imperceptibly in her chair. She was quite certain that Minnie did not mean to put her shy elder sister under her thumb, but she could not help but notice that Kitty was at her most engaged during their lessons whenever Minnie was sent to the corner.

But Minnie was determined to be difficult, and she crossed her arms and stomped her foot to make a real effort of it. 'What if I don't _want_ to sit over in the corner with Milly-doll!'

Oh, what hellions young children were! Some days they simply refused to be pleased. However did Hannah manage them all as girls? 

'Oh Minnie,' said Jo with a sigh, 'I know you are cross! You know I used to get into such a temper sometimes. It was terrible, I would punish everyone around me for it. But I know that you have a kind spirit, kinder than mine,' here Minnie's eyes went wide and round, for she had been most wicked that morning, 'and you wouldn't want to distract your dear sister from her lesson, would you?'

Guilt took hold of Minnie's lower lip and set it to trembling. 'N-no,' she said. 'I don't mean to be a-any trouble.' She began to cry; Jo began to fuss. 

Kitty sighed and slumped while Jo tended to her sister. Just this morning, she had told herself that she would use the Latin lesson as an excuse to finally ask after mystery Laurie, whose name was written all over their used workbooks. Laurie, whom Jo never spoke about if not with grief, and who had almost certainly died under tragic circumstances. Why else would Jo switch so often between present and past tense when speaking of him? 

Maybe they had been _engaged_ \- maybe he had been _handsome_ \- maybe he had _died_ in The _War_! And now Jo simply could never love another, even though she was so kind and clever, and the Professor did love her so.

O how romantic Jo's life must be! How Kitty wished to be half so enchanting as her.

* * *

_7 years earlier_   
_Concord, MA_

'Latin,' said Laurie sourly, 'is no privilege - no matter what old John Brooke has to say about it!'

The day was sunny and beautiful, near idyllic. They were by the pond, laying out on a worn blanket Jo had saved for just such an occasion, Laurie struggling vainly through his workbook, Jo re-reading her smuggled Shelley. Well, Jo put down her book when he started speaking, though she did so hate being forced from her reading, and looked directly at him as he finished.

'Poor Teddy,' said Jo, after a moment, 'always forced to learn things!' She began petting his hair, which was shorter now than she liked it - though she touched it more often, with a clear air of unhappiness - and so the perfect length for him. 'Always made to speak forcefully on subjects about which you have no opinion whatsoever - always expected to think, and reason, and opine - never expected to be a silent, stupid thing!'

He thought of the way one of his grandfather's associates, a Robert Allen, had startled to see him in the summertime once, brown all over from the sun; the way the man had recoiled from him, and never again looked him in the face when he spoke, or made any sort of sign that he knew him to be there when Grandfather was not nearby - save for a slight curling of his lip.

But Laurie did not say this. 'I'm quite certain Grandfather thinks I must be stupid,' he said instead. 'Otherwise why would he have me shut up with old John Brooke all day?'

'John Brooke isn't so old,' said Jo. Didn't she sound cross! As if she hadn't said worse about Brooke just last week when he was flirting around with Meg in town. 'I don't know why you insist on saying that.'

'I'm feeling uncharitable, I suppose,' said Laurie, flopping back down on the blanket. The sky was a wonderful brilliant blue, little clouds passing merrily along, looping onto the ire in his chest and pulling it free. 'Oh Jo, I know I'm wrong to complain. I know Grandfather just wants me to succeed. And I know an education is,' he tried not to pause, 'an economic advantage. I just wish it weren't so tedious sometimes.'

Jo looked down at him laying there, her grey eyes warm and thoughtful; and she plopped down on her back beside him with a sigh of skirts. Laurie hid the full force of his smile. Nothing on Earth could have prevented him from reaching for her hand.

'If I could read another language,' said Jo, 'I think I'd just shut myself up in the attic with all the different books I could get my hands on. And anytime anyone came to come bother me, I'd just tell them a story that I'd read. And they'd forget all about what it is they'd wanted to say, and go on their own way. And we'd all just be terribly happy, with no sort of expectation.'

How wistful she was. How dreadfully lonely her words.

'But then people would come for miles to hear your stories,' said Laurie. 'You wouldn't even have time to read after a while. So you'd have to tell your own stories. And you'd tell so many stories that they'd take on a life of their own. Animals would speak in verse - trees would dance and disappear - people would grow wings and fly!'

'Hm - sounds dangerous. A witch must've put a terrible curse on me to make me so powerful, and to keep all of us trapped inside,' Jo said, for there was nothing she liked so much as applying rules around the absurd to make it seem real. She turned to look at him, eyes sparkling with mirth. 'How would I escape?'

'Why, I don't know,' said Laurie, smiling helplessly. 'How would you escape?'

'Well - first I would send a message through the trees,' said Jo, 'until I found you.'

Laurie's heart thumped within his chest. 'Surely I would've been there all along? Trapped, as sure as dear Marmee and your sisters would have been, there in your home.'

'My dear boy,' Jo reached up to ruffle his hair with a smile. 'You are far too clever to fall under my spell!'

**Author's Note:**

> To sketch out the world of Concord, Mass., in the 1860s where the March family lives, Gerwig studied paintings by Winslow Homer, Lilly Martin Spencer and Seymour Joseph Guy ... Guy’s oil painting of children reading fairy tales in bed evoked the very hue of childhood. In the film, “everything, whether it’s the sunlight or the firelight, feels golden,” Gerwig said. When the sisters reach adulthood, the light turns white. “It’s not cold,” she said, “but it’s less magical.”
> 
> \- Amanda Hess, [How Greta Gerwig Built Her 'Little Women'](https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/20/movies/little-women-inspirations.html)


End file.
